scholarly journals Sentenced “For ideological and political reasons”? The rehabilitation of Dragoljub “Draza” Mihailovic in Serbia

Sociologija ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 54 (4) ◽  
pp. 625-648
Author(s):  
Tomislav Dulic
Keyword(s):  
Due Process ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
International Standards ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Legal Principles ◽  
The Past ◽  
War Criminals ◽  
Over Time

The author analyses the current process pertaining to the legal rehabilitation of Dragoljub ?Draza? Mihailovic, the leader of the Yugoslav Army in the Fatherland, by first placing the process in relation to European-wide trends of coming to terms with the past. He then moves to a discussion of the Serbian law on rehabilitation, where he points to a number of contradictions and inconsistencies, particularly with regard to the issue of whether war criminals can be rehabilitated. The author then turns to a historical analysis of Mihailovic?s wartime activities, with particular emphasis on the issues of treason and war crimes. It is the author?s main argument that Mihailovic became embroiled in various forms of collusion with the enemy, although these varied considerably over time. More importantly, however, Mihailovic violated a number of legal principles of international humanitarian law, which means that he would have been sentenced today by any court applying the highest international standards of due process. While this would make him ineligible for rehabilitation according to recent political statements and the law of 2011, complications might arise due to the fact that Mihailovic?s case will be heard in accordance with a previous law from 2006.

Building a Case against the War Criminals

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dean Aszkielowicz
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
International Agreements ◽  
Second World War ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
World War ◽  
War Criminals ◽  
Post War ◽  
Second World

Long before the Second World War ended, the Allies were planning to prosecute Axis war criminals, including both those in positions of leadership and the perpetrators of individual crimes. There was no standing war crimes court at the end of the Second World War, however, and the post-war trials were a watershed in international law. For the trials at Nuremberg and Tokyo, Allied planners drew on the development of international humanitarian law and international agreements signed by the combatants over the decades preceding the war. The vast majority of war criminals who were prosecuted did not face the court at Nuremberg or Tokyo: they appeared before national military tribunals which were conducted according to each prosecuting country’s war crimes law. The Australian War Crimes Act passed through the parliament in October 1945, shortly before trials began.

scholarly journals EU support to domestic prosecution of violations of International Humanitarian Law

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-66
Author(s):  
Bettina Steible
Keyword(s):  
Collective Responsibility ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Universal Jurisdiction ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Geneva Conventions ◽  
War Criminals ◽  
Third Dimension ◽  
Eu Support ◽  
The Eu

The Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 establish an obligation to ensure respect for International Humanitarian Law (IHL) at all times. This summary obligation is now understood as enshrining a mechanism of collective responsibility whereby all State parties commit to adopt all the necessary and reasonable measures to prevent and stop violations of IHL, but also to prosecute them when they amount to war crimes. This third dimension is comprised in articles 49/50/129/146 of Conventions, which impose an obligation on its State parties to extradite or prosecute (aut dedere aut judicare) alleged perpetrators of grave breaches, including on the basis of universal jurisdiction if needed. As the EU has manifested its interest in ensuring respect for IHL with the adoption of the Guidelines on promoting compliance with IHL, the objective of this article is to analyze whether and to what extent the EU has developed instruments facilitating domestic prosecution of alleged war criminals pursuant to the Geneva Conventions.

The Application of International Humanitarian Law by the Israel Defense Forces

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amichai Cohen ◽  
Eyal Ben-Ari
Keyword(s):  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Advocate General ◽  
The Past ◽  
Junior Officers ◽  
Military Commanders ◽  
Legal Frameworks ◽  
Israel Defense Forces ◽  
The Military

This chapter describes how increased juridification and demands to apply international humanitarian law (IHL) have influenced the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The authors analyze the IDF’s compliance with IHL and other legal frameworks through a multilevel and multidimensional model of military compliance describing the law and external institutions involved in applying it. The past decades have seen the relatively autonomous sphere of the military increasingly come under judicial overview. Judicial and international pressures have also increased the role of the operational legal advisors. The chapter ends by discussing the ceremonies intended to promote compliance with IHL involving soldiers and junior officers. It is based on interviews (with Israeli academic experts, members of nongovernmental organizations [NGOs], and military commanders), off-the-record conversations with members of the IDF’s Military Advocate General, and newspaper articles, reports of NGOs, and secondary material.

The ICRC Library goes digital

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-2
Keyword(s):  
International Committee ◽  
Red Cross ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Reference Library ◽  
Parallel Development ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
The Core ◽  
The Past

The ICRC Library is home to unique collections retracing the parallel development of humanitarian action and law during the past 150+ years. With the core of these collections now digitized, this reference library on international humanitarian law (IHL) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is a resource available to all, anytime, anywhere.

Trends in Global Disarmament Treaties

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart Casey-Maslen ◽  
Tobias Vestner
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Biological Weapons ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
State Party ◽  
Chemical Weapons Convention ◽  
Support Mechanisms ◽  
Biological Weapons Convention ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Core Features

Abstract Since the adoption of the UN Charter, states have concluded numerous international disarmament treaties. What are their core features, and are there any trends in their design? This article discusses the five global disarmament treaties, namely the 1971 Biological Weapons Convention, the 1992 Chemical Weapons Convention, the 1997 Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions and the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. It first considers how a broad set of prohibitions of activities with respect to specific weapons has evolved over time. Then, it analyses the treaties’ implementation and compliance support mechanisms as well as their procedural aspects regarding entry into force and withdrawal. This article finds that a pattern has developed over the last two decades to outlaw all and any use of weapons by disarmament treaty, without first instituting a prohibition on their use under international humanitarian law (IHL). It also finds that reporting obligations, meetings of States Parties and treaty-related institutions are generally created, either directly by treaty or by subsequent state party decisions. Finally, there is a tendency to make the treaty’s entry into force easier, and the withdrawal more difficult. It is argued that these trends arise from states’ attempt to establish more easily disarmament treaties, design more robust disarmament treaties and more effectively protect civilians. The article concludes by reflecting whether these trends form the basis of a new branch of international law—international disarmament law—and discusses them in the context of emerging weapons and technologies.

Bridging the Accountability Gap

2020 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 567-597
Author(s):  
Hannes Jöbstl
Keyword(s):  
War Crimes ◽  
International Committee ◽  
Customary Law ◽  
Red Cross ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Penal Sanctions ◽  
Accountability Gap ◽  
Alternative Solutions

Abstract During non-international armed conflict, war crimes often go unpunished in areas where state authorities are unable to enforce the law. While states are under a customary law obligation to investigate and prosecute war crimes committed on their territory or by their nationals, the Customary International Humanitarian Law Study of the International Committee of the Red Cross has not found that this obligation extends to armed non-state actors (ANSAs). Nevertheless, command responsibility requires the individual commander to punish their forces in case war crimes have been committed and a growing amount of state practice demanding similar commitments — both legally and politically — from these actors as such can be observed over the past two decades. Indeed, ANSAs routinely impose penal sanctions onto their subordinates and often establish judicial structures in order to do so. This article argues that whereas ANSAs should be under some form of obligation to ensure accountability, alternative solutions to makeshift courts and penal proceedings might be better suited to prevent impunity and maintain fair trial guarantees.

scholarly journals SYRIA – “THE WAR WITH MULTIPLE PROXIES”. VIOLATIONS OF INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW AND HUMAN RIGHTS

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 167-178
Author(s):  
Daniela Vetina Ene
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Civil War ◽  
International Conflict ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Amnesty International ◽  
Geneva Conventions ◽  
The Arab Spring

The civil war in Syria, triggered by the pro-democracy demonstrations of the "Arab Spring", was a complicated combination of religious, cultural and ethnic-identity contradictions. The non-international conflict was turned into a "battlefield" for foreign powers, which led to the transformation of a civil war into a "war with multiple proxies". The United Nations' efforts to mediate the conflict, based on a six-point plan, remained in the draft phase. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have denounced flagrant violations of human rights and international humanitarian law by the al-Assad regime, which has widely used non-discriminatory weapons banned in violation of the Geneva Conventions, 1949. The Bashār al-Assad regime is accused by the international community of being guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, but attempts to incriminate it have failed.

scholarly journals Features of detection and obtaining evidence of war crimes committed in the context of international armed conflict

2021 ◽  
Vol 39 (69) ◽  
pp. 74-90
Author(s):  
Ihor Tataryn ◽  
Yuliia Komissarchuk ◽  
Yurii Dmytryk ◽  
Mariia Maistrenko ◽  
Olha Rymarchuk
Keyword(s):  
Armed Conflict ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Scientific Article ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Comprehensive Understanding ◽  
Military Conflict ◽  
Support Organization ◽  
International Obligations ◽  
The Military

The scientific article is devoted to a comprehensive understanding of international legal, procedural, and organizational problems of investigation of war crimes committed during the military conflict in the south and east of Ukraine. It develops the author's concept of investigation of war crimes committed during the armed conflict, scientifically substantiated theoretical provisions and specific patterns that are manifested in the field of legal support, organization of investigation, collection of evidence, methods of investigation of crimes of this type. It is concluded that there is a need to specify the components of war crimes in national legislation. Recommendations for further improvement of criminal and criminal procedure legislation of Ukraine in order to fulfill the state's international obligations in the field of international humanitarian law are given.

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